Books
A Noisey Christmas Special with Big Boi: “How The Grinch Stole Christmas” (Read by Big Boi)
Even more hip-hop-related grinchitude! Courtesy Noisey:
We are very excited to announce our first annual Noisey Christmas Special. To kick it off we got Big Boi aka Daddy Fat Sacks aka Sir Lucious Left Foot aka one half of the mighty OutKast to stop by the VICE offices to entertain all the good little girls and boys with a reading of Dr. Seuss’s Christmas time classic “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”
[Audio] Listen to Jalylah’s Spook Mix 2 for Issue One of Spook Magazine
The launch event already passed a couple weeks ago, but this mix by the homegirl, Jalylah to celebrate the debut issue of Spook, the “literary arts mixtape” (read, literary arts magazine) by Jason Parham is still worth sharing. Set list follows, learn more about Spook HERE.
Track Listing:
“Intro (Jalylah’s Theme)” Hezekiah feat. Muhsinah
“The Alarm” Big K.R.I.T.
“Wake Up Suite” The Natural Spiritual Orchestra/”Photography” Nikki Giovanni
“Unspoken Dreams of Light” Eugene McDaniels
“Beggars For Sun” C-Mon & Kypski feat. Benny
“A Bright Light On The Dark Side Of Town” Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson
“Just Vybe” DVA feat. Fatima
“Something in the Water” Zaki Ibrahim
“Orange Glow” Amel Larrieux
“Beam Me Up” Kissey Asplund
“High On Sunshine” The 5th Dimension
“Day Break” The Brand New Heavies
“In The Sun” Adriana Evans
“Brand New Day” Dorothy Morrison
“Flow” Yellowtail feat. Jeni Fujita
“Golden Time of Day” Maze feat. Frankie Beverly
“Right With Life” Melinda Camille
“Outro (Distractions 2)” Roy Hargrove
Read an Excerpt from O: A Presidential Novel
The last campaign had tested his self-control. The eighteen-hour days, the frenetic travel, the bad food, the loss of autonomy, and the silly expectations imposed on him. The ersatz patriotism. The feigned conviviality with strangers who asked him outlandish questions. suffering the predictable whining of reporters who swooned to his message of change but were themselves averse to change. You dropped two points in a poll or said something obviously true but too blunt for ears trained to detect danger in honesty and they were at your throat. People crowding you every waking minute. Take a few days to recharge or a couple of hours to shoot some hoops or take your wife out, and you’re cocky or lackadaisical.
But he had kept it together, mostly. In private, he could become cross when mistakes occurred or when assurances proved false or when pressed to conform to campaign orthodoxies he thought stupid. But staff who had experienced his displeasure marveled at his ability to appear unbothered and focused in public. He didn’t overreact to unexpected setbacks. He never acted impulsively when surprised. Never let his instincts, which were as insistent as any politician’s, overcome his reason. Never seemed to give a [expletive] when reporters or griping party insiders were concerned he wasn’t hustling enough, responding to attacks quickly enough, worrying enough. He never appeared anxious over the outcome or desperate for the office. He told his story. He was different and he would make the stupid, maddening business of Washington politics different.
[Click the ‘more…’ or ‘continue reading’ links below link to read the rest of the excerpt, courtesy NYT]
Related:
Obama inspired book is political science fiction. [Toronto Star]
Racists Totally Freak Out Over Muslim ‘Batman of Paris’
“Another day, another racist freakout over non-white superheroes. But unlike the hilariously dishonest racism we saw when the Council of Conservative Citizens called for a boycott of Marvel’s Thor movie on account of a mythical Norse god’s depiction as a black man, a recent round of conservative attacks on Nightrunner — DC’s Muslim Batman of Paris — are prejudicial in a more insidious way. While the CCC put forth a laughably tenuous justification for their outrage, it was with respect to one specific character in one specific context. The argument against Nightrunner, led by conservative blogger Warner Todd Huston, is based on the bigoted belief that a Muslim superhero is by definition an exercise in deceitful political correctness, and that Muslims are natively evil.
Introduced in this month’s Detective Comics Annual #12 and Batman Annual #28, Nightrunner is a 22-year-old Algerian Muslim who’s lived in Paris his entire life (it seems reasonable to assume he was born in France, but at the very least he was raised there). Born Billai Asseiah, the character is uncommonly adept at the highly YouTubeable gymnastic form known as parkour. That and Asseiah’s sense of justice make him an ideal recruit for Bruce Wayne’s new Batman, Inc. initiative, whereby he franchises Batmen to cities all over the world.
Huston views French Muslims — which is to say, immigrants or those descended from immigrants — as inauthentically French, and, as such, that Batman would choose a Muslim as Paris’ champion is gravely offensive to him and his loathsome ilk….”
One word in Mark Twain’s Huckeberry Finn is at least one syllable too long for our modern times!
I was musing on twitter yesterday that I wasn’t sure I was down with this edited censored version of Huck Finn that’s about to be released. What do y’all think though?
MP3: Eminem – Syllables feat. Jay-Z, 50 Cent, Dr. Dre, Stat Quo & Ca$his by Oncle BK
Read more:
– Dr. Alan Gribben explains why he chose to create this edited version of Huckleberry Finn by editing out the word “n*gger” and the name, “Injun Joe” (?!) in an excerpt from its introduction.
– Film critic, Roger Ebert has twitter going NUTS after tweeting “I’d rather be called a N***** than a Slave.” For the record I think I agree with him! [The Grio]
– Earl Ofari Hutchinson on Why the n-word should stay in Huck Finn. [The Grio]
– Mark Anthony Neal says Don’t Take The ‘Ni**er Jim’ Out My Story. [The Loop21]
Below:
Earl Ofari Hutchinson speaks on the controversy on MSNBC (although this player won’t play in Canada so I don’t know what he said).